Suddenly a Stay-at-Home Dad? : Short- and Long-Term Consequences of Fathers‘ Job Loss on Time Investment in the Household
Autor/in:
Hennecke, Juliane; Pape, Astrid
Quelle: IZA Institut of Labor Economics; (IZA Discussion Paper, 13866), 2020.
Inhalt: Commonly described as the “gender care gap”, there is a persistent gender difference in the division of domestic responsibilities in most developed countries. We provide novel evidence on the short- and long-run effects of an exogenous shock on paternal availability, through a job loss, on the allocation of domestic work within couples. We find that paternal child care and housework significantly increase in the short run on weekdays, while we do not see any similar shifts on weekends. Effects are positive and persistent for fathers who remain unemployed or have a working partner, but reverse after re-employment. We also find significant changes for female partners as well as in the cumulative household time investments and the outsourcing of tasks, depending on the labor force statuses of both partners. We theoretically discuss time availability and financial constraints, relative bargaining powers, gender role attitudes, and emotional bonds as potential explanations for the effects.
The Gender Aspect of Immigrants‘ Assimilation in Europe
Autor/in:
Hoon Lee, Tae; Peri, Giovanni; Viarengo, Martina
Quelle: IZA Institut of Labor Economics; (IZA Discussion Paper, 13922), 2020.
Inhalt: The labor market performance of immigrants relative to natives has been widely studied but its gender dimension has been relatively neglected. Our paper aims at revisiting labor market convergence between immigrants and natives and examining this under-studied dimension in a comprehensive study of the EU-15 countries and Switzerland over the period 1999-2018. We measure convergence of labor market outcomes for male and female migrants to similar natives before and after the Great Recession and across countries of destination. Our results show that in most countries female migrants start with a larger employment gap but converge more rapidly than male migrants do. We also provide a broad overview of the role of potential factors such as economic conditions, labor markets structure, institutions and attitudes towards immigrants and women and their association with employment convergence of all immigrants and female immigrants specifically. While the analysis provides an interesting insight, we do not identify very significant factors at the national level. We find a very strong correlation between attitudes towards immigrants and their employment convergence across sub-national regions.
STEM Occupations and the Gender Gap: What Can We Learn from Job Tasks?
Autor/in:
Speer, Jasmin D.
Quelle: IZA Institut of Labor Economics; (IZA Discussion Paper, 13734), 2020.
Inhalt: Policymakers often promote the importance of STEM jobs but are concerned about the underrepresentation of women and minorities in these jobs. However, there is no agreedupon definition of STEM jobs. I use occupation task data from O*Net to analyze the STEM task content of occupations, drawing several conclusions. First, there is no clear, robust definition of STEM occupations, even when using task data. The occupations included are highly sensitive to the cut-offs and methods used. Second, there are a number of occupations that should clearly be considered STEM by task content but are typically not, including nurse practitioners, pharmacists, and economists. Third, the gender gap in STEM jobs depends heavily on how one defines STEM. One traditional definition shows that STEM jobs are 76% male, but most task-based definitions show gender gaps only half as large (62-65% male). Racial gaps in STEM and the earnings premium for STEM occupations (35-43%) are fairly stable across definitions. The results imply that policies promoting traditionally-defined STEM jobs can unnecessarily exclude women and draw workers away from other important occupations.
Schlagwörter:exclusion; gender gap; minority; MINT; STEM; women
CEWS Kategorie:Arbeitswelt und Arbeitsmarkt, Naturwissenschaft und Technik
Children and the Remaining Gender Gaps in the Labor Market
Autor/in:
Cortes, Partricia; Pan, Jesscia
Quelle: IZA Institut of Labor Economics; (IZA Discussion Paper, 13759), 2020.
Inhalt: The past five decades have seen a remarkable convergence in the economic roles of men and women in society. Yet, persistently large gender gaps in terms of labor supply, earnings, and representation in top jobs remain. Moreover, in countries like the U.S., convergence in labor market outcomes appears to have slowed in recent decades. In this article, we focus on the role of children and show that many potential explanations for the remaining gender disparities in labor market outcomes are related to the fact that children impose significantly larger penalties on the career trajectories of women relative to men. In the U.S., we document that close to two-thirds of the overall gender earnings gap can be accounted for by the differential impacts of children on women and men. We propose a simple model of household decision-making to motivate the link between children and gender gaps in the labor market, and to help rationalize how various factors potentially interact with parenthood to produce differential outcomes for men and women. We discuss several forces that might make the road to gender equity even more challenging for modern cohorts of parents, and offer a critical discussion of public policies in seeking to address the remaining gaps.
Quelle: IZA Institut of Labor Economics; (IZA Discussion Paper, 13754), 2020.
Inhalt: Does flexible pay increase the gender wage gap? To answer this question we analyze the wages of public-school teachers in Wisconsin, where a 2011 reform allowed school districts to set teachers’ pay more flexibly and engage in individual negotiations. Using quasiexogenous variation in the timing of the introduction of flexible pay driven by the expiration of preexisting collective-bargaining agreements, we show that flexible pay increased the gender pay gap among teachers with the same credentials. This gap is larger for younger teachers and absent for teachers working under a female principal or superintendent. Survey evidence suggests that the gap is partly driven by women not engaging in negotiations over pay, especially when the counterpart is a man. This gap is not driven by gender differences in job mobility, ability, or a higher demand for male teachers. We conclude that environmental factors are an important determinant of the gender wage gap in contexts where workers are required to negotiate.
Quelle: IZA Institut of Labor Economics; (IZA Policy Paper, 168), 2020.
Inhalt: This paper explores the recent efforts by the corporate world and public policy to increase the number of women in leadership positions in the workplace. We review and empirically evaluate the “business case” for gender equality, showing some evidence in favour of it. Despite the evidence and growing support, progress towards more diversity in leadership positions has been slow. We study the importance of supply-side constraints, as well as the main diversity policies (gender quotas, mentoring and network programs, diversity training to change firm culture, and family friendly policies) that have been implemented. We focus on the effectiveness of these policies, their shortcomings, as well as potential future steps that could help guide policy.
Schlagwörter:diversity policy; gender equality; women in leadership; working environment; workplace
CEWS Kategorie:Arbeitswelt und Arbeitsmarkt, Diversity
Do Nominations Close the Gender Gap in Competition?
Autor/in:
Ifcher, John; Zarghamee, Homa
Quelle: IZA Institut of Labor Economics; (IZA Discussion Paper, 13852), 2020.
Inhalt: Experiments have demonstrated that men are more willing to compete than women in stereotypically male tasks. We examine whether nominations close this gender gap. For example, are male nominators more willing than female nominators to enter nominees into competitions. Further, we consider the interaction between nominator and nominee gender. For example, do men shy away from entering women into competitions, or do they make them compete too much? We find a gender gap in neither nominators’ willingness to enter nominees into competitions, nor in nominees’ likelihood to be entered into competitions. Interestingly, male and female nominators willingness to enter nominees into competitions is statistically indistinguishable from women’s willingness to enter themselves into competitions. We also find that men are significantly more likely to enter themselves than others into competitions; this suggests that a nominating process that excludes self-nominations could have an equalizing effect on the proportion of men and women who enter competitions. Our results also reinforce the assertion that the gender gap in competitive preferences is driven by the “thrill or fear of performing in a competitive environment (Niederle & Vesterlund, 2007),” as this motivation is absent in decisionmaking for others.
Quelle: IZA Institut of Labor Economics; (IZA Discussion Paper, 13877), 2020.
Inhalt: Concerns about gender equality have jumped to the forefront of public debate in recent years, and Gender Economics is slowly affirming its place as a major field of study. This assessment examines where we are in terms of gender equality. It reviews the theoretical foundations that can explain existing inequalities, and documents the empirical findings supported by the theories, identifying avenues for future research and providing a fruitful framework to think about the effectiveness of policies and interventions targeting gender inequality. In doing so, I provide the foundations against which the contributions in this issue can be placed.
Quelle: IZA Institut of Labor Economics; Bonn (Discussion Paper Series, 12611), 2019.
Inhalt: I hire 2,700 workers for a transcription job, randomly assigning the gender of their (fictitious) manager and provision of performance feedback. While praise from a manager has no effect, criticism negatively impacts workers’ job satisfaction and perception of the task’s importance. When female managers, rather than male, deliver this feedback, the negative effects double in magnitude. Having a critical female manager does not affect effort provision but it does lower workers’ interest in working for the firm in the future. These findings hold for both female and male workers. I show that results are consistent with gendered expectations of feedback among workers. By contrast, I find no evidence for the role of either attention discrimination or implicit gender bias.
In einem aktuellen IZA-Forschungspapier geht Martin Abel einer weiteren möglichen Ursache nach: Geschlechterdiskriminierung durch Untergebene.
Der Ökonom am Middlebury College im US-Staat Vermont bot über eine Online-Plattform reale Arbeitsaufträge eines fiktiven Unternehmens an. Den auf diese Weise gewonnenen 2.700 Arbeitskräften teilte er per Zufallsprinzip (ebenfalls fiktive) männliche oder weibliche Vorgesetzte zu, die den Beschäftigten im Verlauf ihrer Tätigkeit schriftliches Feedback zur Qualität der geleisteten Arbeit gaben.
Stärkere Reaktion auf weibliche Kritik: Bei negativer Kritik an der Arbeitsleistung ging die Jobzufriedenheit der Betroffenen erwartungsgemäß zurück. Allerdings fiel dieser Rückgang um 70 Prozent höher aus, wenn die Kritik von einer weiblichen Vorgesetzten kam. Im Vergleich zu gleichlautender Kritik durch männliche Vorgesetzte verdoppelte sich außerdem der Anteil der Beschäftigten, die nach eigenen Angaben an einer weiteren Zusammenarbeit mit dem Unternehmen nicht mehr interessiert waren. Diese diskriminierende Haltung gegenüber Chefinnen war bei männlichen und weiblichen Arbeitskräften gleichermaßen ausgeprägt. Nach Einschätzung des Forschers kann derartiges Verhalten von untergebenen die Führungsambitionen von Frauen konterkarieren. Denn allzu ablehnende Reaktionen auf berechtigte Kritik könnte weibliche Vorgesetzte dazu bewegen, einen weniger effektiven Führungsstil zu pflegen, der ihrem weiteren Aufstieg im Wege steht, oder sie verzichten möglicherweise freiwillig auf zusätzliche Personalverantwortung.
Doch wie kommt es überhaupt zu den Überreaktionen auf weibliche Kritik? Die Studie liefert dazu eine Reihe von hinweisen. Zunächst zeigt sich, dass Chefinnen keineswegs ignoriert werden. Im Gegenteil: Die Beschäftigten nehmen sich im Schnitt sogar etwas mehr Zeit, um das Feedback weiblicher Vorgesetzter zu verarbeiten. Auch implizite Vorurteile spielen offenbar keine nennenswerte Rolle. Zwar assoziieren die Beschäftigten tendenziell eher Männer mit Karriere und Frauen mit Familie, doch das diskriminierende Verhalten gegenüber weiblichen Vorgesetzten ist davon weitgehend unabhängig. Vielmehr deuten die Ergebnisse darauf hin, dass geschlechtsspezifische Erwartungen an den Führungsstil ausschlaggebend sind. während Lob dreimal häufiger mit weiblichen Vorgesetzten in Verbindung gebracht wird, wird Kritik doppelt so oft männlichen Chefs zugeschrieben. wenn kritische Chefinnen also diesen Rollenerwartungen nicht gerecht werden, kann das die beobachteten negativen Reaktionen auslösen.
Zwar betont Abel, dass sich seine in der „Plattformökonomie“ gewonnenen Erkenntnisse nicht zwingend auf klassischere Arbeitsumgebungen übertragen lassen. Allerdings seien sie nicht zuletzt deswegen besonders aufschlussreich, weil die modernen Möglichkeiten des flexiblen Arbeitens insbesondere Frauen zugutekommen könnten, zugleich jedoch wenig Schutz gegen Diskriminierung böten
Schlagwörter:Erwartung; Frauen in Führungspositionen; Führungsposition; gender bias; Geschlechterdiskriminierung
CEWS Kategorie:Arbeitswelt und Arbeitsmarkt, Geschlechterverhältnis
Are Women Doing It For Themselves? : Gender Segregation and the Gender Wage Gap
Autor/in:
Theodoropoulos, Nikolaos; Forth, John; Bryson, Alex
Quelle: IZA Institut of Labor Economics; (IZA Discussion Paper, 12657), 2019.
Inhalt: Using matched employer-employee data from the 2004 and 2011 Workplace Employment Relations Surveys (WERS) for Britain we find a raw gender wage gap (GWG) in hourly wages of around 0.18-0.21 log points. The regression-adjusted gap is around half that. However, the GWG declines substantially with the increasing share of female managers in the workplace.
The gap closes because women’s wages rise with the share female managers in the workplace while men’s wages fall. Panel and instrumental variables estimates suggest the share of female managers in the workplace has a causal impact in reducing the GWG. The role of female managers in closing the GWG is more pronounced when employees are paid for performance, consistent with the proposition that women are more likely to be paid equitably when managers have discretion in the way they reward performance and those managers are women. These findings suggest a stronger presence of women in managerial positions can help tackle the GWG.